


Moments When The Words Don't Reach

by Fangirlingmanaged



Series: Even More Angst Nobody Asked For (AKA Bonus Content) [8]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Healing, Hurt Tony Stark, M/M, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Protective Steve, Steve Feels, Tony Feels, Tony Needs a Hug, Tony Stark Has Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-05
Updated: 2016-08-05
Packaged: 2018-07-29 11:27:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7682707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fangirlingmanaged/pseuds/Fangirlingmanaged
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You break things, and you walk away because a part of you doesn't want to see. Doesn't want to imagine the damage you caused, but then... THEN you come back, and it's much worse. It's much worse than you could have ever imagined. <br/>But you're here now, and you gotta man up. You gotta fight for what you want, and who you love, and this is Tony... and it'll be difficult, but Erskine didn't make you Captain America for you to run away now. <br/>(Third Person POV)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Moments When The Words Don't Reach

Steve comes to, for the first time in months, slowly and calmly. He doesn’t trash around enough to fall off his bed, and neither does he wake up with a scream ringing in his ears. He doesn’t wake up with the sting of tears or phantom sweat in his eyes. He doesn’t wake up with the taste of blood and dirt and grief on his tongue. Instead, he wakes up with the sweet aroma of coffee, grease, and expensive cologne. He wakes up warm, for once.

This, as most good things in his life, doesn’t last long. Like an anvil in one of those weird cartoons Clint watches, the weight of the previous night crashes down onto his shoulders. He flings his arm out, hand grasping at empty air, and his eyes snap open in panic. He sits bolt upright and looks around with unfocused eye for the thing he had bene taking care of. For the one person he was sure he needed to survive and hadn’t known he’d come so close to losing. And now here he was, being stupid again, he’d fallen asleep and now he’d woken up alone and dear Lord what if…

Oh… _oh, there he is_ , the thought pops up before he can even register what he’s seeing. Unbelievable relief floods his mind before he notices just how not okay either of them are. He’s reaching out a hand to pull at his lover, Dear God his _baby_ , and then he sees Tony flinch. Steve’s shaking hand drops back to the bed and he fists the covers to pretend like he doesn’t feel the pain his heart has just been lanced with.

Tony is _wrecked_. He’s sitting against the headboard, as far away from Steve as he could possibly get, with his knees held tightly against his chest. His usually bright eyes are bloodshot and unfocused as they gaze at Steve. The soldier doesn’t know if the other man can even _see_ him, though by the way he’s shaking it looks like he isn’t seeing anything _else_ but him. That thought rises bile to his throat, and when his gaze falls? When his eyes notice what he’s holding? He has to make a quick lunge for the waste basket under the side table.

Tony has _the thing_ grasped loosely in one of his hands.

“ _Tony_ ,” Steve says desperately because what else is he supposed to say? What else is there _for_ him to say when Tony is so obviously not okay? How the _fuck_ is he supposed to make this right?

“You know it’s funny,” Tony saws hoarsely. He’s still staring at Steve as though he’ll try something if he so much as looks away. Steve closes his eyes to stifle the pain at that realization. “We do this every morning, or afternoon, or whenever the fuck I wake up, but it’s never gone quite like this.” He waves the hand with the gun between them.

“Wh-what do you—Tony, what—?” Steve can’t make sense of what he’s saying past the fear and pain gripping his whole being.

“ _That_ ,” Tony points the gun straight at his face. Steve isn’t afraid of him shooting him no matter how much Tony might want. In that they are different. Steve is confident in the knowledge that the other man would never hurt him. It’s something that they, obviously, don’t share. “When I scream myself awake,” Steve makes a wounded noise in the back of his throat because he knew, _he knew that would happen_ , but he wasn’t there. Yet another promise he’d broken. “And you’re here, you don’t talk. You don’t say anything, you just stare at me, and… and…” watching Tony struggle through the chaos in his own mind is agony. “You look at me like… not like _that_ ,” Tony waves the gun in the direction of his eyes, “you just, you blame me, I know.”

“ _I don’t_ ” Steve chokes out. Tony doesn’t seem to hear him.

“But you… you’ve never said anything. And I just… you’re… man, my mind is good, you know? You sound exactly like…. Like _you_ , I guess, but… I don’t… what gives?” Tony’s eyes well up with tears like the crack on the damn bursts. He’s not glaring at Steve, and maybe he _can’t_ , just looks at him with eyes unfocused by grief and pain. “You don’t… it’s _worse_ , you asshole, it’s _worse_ if you talk!” the scream makes Steve jump. “ _You don’t get to do that! You don’t get to hurt me more! WHY NOW?!”_ Tony’s arms tighten around his legs.

“I’m real,” Steve whispers miserably. He raises his shaking arm again, and bites down on his tongue to keep from screaming when Tony flinches away yet again, and touches the first part of him that he can. It’s one of his arms where he’s holding his legs. Tony’s skin is overly warm, but Steve feels them. The goosebumps that aren’t just on him. “I am real. I am real, and I’m here, and I am so _sorry_ , my love.” Steve didn’t realize he’d been getting closer until he’s staring down the barrel of the gun he’d forgotten the other man had.

“They did that,” Tony says hoarsely. The tears keep flowing down his cheeks and Steve would wipe them away if he wasn’t so uncertain of how to proceed. “I don’t know how you broke out, Ethan, but it won’t work. Not again. Fool me once and all that.” And the pieces fall into place with blinding clarity. What Tasha had told them about. The whole reason he was even able to be there with Tony.

“It’s me,” Steve tells him wretchedly. Tony is still staring at him, and he the soldier knows the other man doesn’t believe him. God knows how the others used his weakness for Steve against him. Against his better judgement, Steve raises his hand to grasp at the barrel. Tony doesn’t relent his grip on it, but he doesn’t shoot either. “It’s me, Tony. _Look at me, sweetheart_. It’s really me.” And then, with his instincts on high alert, he puts the barrel against his chest. “It’s me, Shellhead.”

“You can’t—I—Friday, call— _what are you doing! You can’t be here!_ Ross—Oh, God, he’ll—“ the gun, thankfully, drops from Tony’s hand. Steve sighs in relief before grabbing hold of Tony’s arm. The scientist’s eyes snap at him, then his hand, then back to his eyes. His shaking has become worse.

“Ross is gone, baby. You did it,” Steve can’t keep the pride from his voice. “He’s gone, do you remember? His trial was yester. He can’t hurt us anymore. You did it.”

“I—“ one of Tony’s shaking hands comes up to rub at his forehead. Steve is becoming concerned with how unfocused he seems to be. Surreptitiously, he moves the fingers holding Tony’s arm lower so that he can feel his pulse. He counts as he watches the other man try to get his thoughts together. _Elevated pulse, pale, unfocused eyes_ , Steve lists off in his head. _Fucking hell._

“Tony,” Steve says as calmly as he can. He gets closer, and sends a small thankful prayer when Tony doesn’t pull away. “I need you to breathe with me. C’mon, baby, like we used to. In and out,” Steve breathes in through his nose and breathes out slowly through his mouth. Tony is still unfocused, though, and his shaking is getting worse. Steve needs to calm him down, and quickly. “C’mon, Shellhead, you’ve got this. Follow me, remember? In,” he waits until Tony takes a shaky inhale, and breathes out. It gets easier from then on.

They spend minutes there, together, bright blue meeting brittle brown. Tony still doesn’t believe he’s real, and Steve wonders how many times he’s had to do this alone. He wonders how he’d failed his lover much more than he’d realized. When Tony comes to, _really_ comes to, he hopes that he finds a way to keep the other man from hearing him. It might too late for them, finally talking it out, but he has to at least try. He’d promised Nat after all, to keep trying till the end itself it that’s what it took for his man to forgive him.

He snaps out of his guilt-ridden thoughts when Tony snatches his arm away from Steve’s gentle grip. When he focuses on the other man’s face, the genius has an ugly scowl on his face. Nonsensically, the only thing Steve can think is, _there’s the fire I was missing_. Tony’s eyes are ablaze with fury and pain, now. He’s let go of his knees and his arms are now crossed tightly across his chest. Steve fights the urge to gag as he realizes why that is. _Why wouldn’t he?_ The angry voice in his head hisses at him, _you’ve aimed at it before, haven’t you? You tried to break his heart from the outside like just tearing it apart inside wasn’t enough._

 _I didn’t,_ Steve denies deliriously even when he knows it’s not true. _That was never my intention._

 _“It wasn’t supposed to end like that!”_ he says desperately. It takes Tony’s snort to realize he’s said it out loud too.

“Then what _was?_ What was the point, then, huh Rogers? What _did_ you mean to do?!” Tony’s burning bright with anger now. Steve’s never seen it before, not even with all the villains they’ve fought together. He’s only seen this directed at Bucky, in that HYDRA compound, but never towards the team. Never towards him. Even during their worse fights at the end, he’s never seen this. “What the _fuck_ else were you trying to do?”

“I was trying to protect—“ _Bucky. The Team. You. ME._ He’s not even clear on who had needed the protection more. Though now, with Tony’s cracked form in front of him, he thinks the choice should have been obvious. It shouldn’t have even had to be a choice at all. “I just wanted to keep us safe.”

“Together,” Tony spits at him. _Ultron._ Steve had said that, hadn’t he? That they could defeat Ultron, could defeat anything, as long as they stayed together. As long as they didn’t keep things from each other. As long as they remained a family, not just Steve and Tony, but the two of them and the team. “You said we’d be together,” Tony’s voice cracks. “You said we could do anything, as long as we kept our family intact. I’ve never had that before, Rogers! I could never trust anyone that much! Why?! Why’d you wreck it?! Why’d you let me fall for it? _Why’d you make me trust you?!”_ Tony lands a solid punch on Steve’s chest, God they haven’t been this close since before the war, and it’s like the dam again. Everything pours out of the brunette. He screams accusations at Steve, alternates between punching weakly at Steve’s chest and grabbing fistfuls of his shirt.

… And Steve sits there and takes it. Closes his eyes tightly and wills them to stop burning with the need for tears.

“I know, baby,” Steve finally says when the fight has gone out of his lover. Tony’s just sitting there listlessly now, his wrists in Steve’s hold, his shoulders shaking. He wants to cry, Steve knows the signs, but won’t let himself. The soldier is back on square one, back to when Tony didn’t trust him, but it’s worse now. It’s infinitely worse because he had it. Tony _had_ trusted him, but Steve had wrecked that. Steve had shown him he _couldn’t_ even when he’d promised he was worthy of it.

 _I won’t be able to even get near Thor’s hammer now,_ Steve finds himself thinking nonsensically.

“The worse part,” Tony says after what could have been hours of painful silence. He raises his head and looks at Steve head on, _forces himself_ , and Steve bites his lip to keep from crying. He looks so lost, the soldier thinks. Like those pictures he keeps of when he was just a boy. When he was just a boy who couldn’t understand why he wasn’t enough. Not for his father or his mother or his Uncle Obie. The little boy who couldn’t understand why everyone who was ever kind always left. Xavier. Aunt Peggy. Jarvis and Anna. “The worst part is that I thought… all this time, I’ve been wondering… and I just… I can’t figure it out.”

“Figure out what?” Steve whispers, afraid of reverting things back to the shouting.

Tony cocks his head to the side in confusion and his brow furrows. _My lost boy_ , Steve thinks like that first night when Tony had ever mentioned his childhood. That first night when Steve had known, irrevocably, that Tony was _his_. “What I did. I’ve been… I’ve been thinking back, you know, every day. Back, back, back. Thinking and thinking, and I came up blank… I thought…. I thought I was doing okay, you know, with the team. I thought… I was trying; I was trying _so hard_ , but… I must have… I still don’t understand why I wasn’t enough!”

“You are!” Steve says vehemently. Tony had gotten slight more hysterical there, by the end of his explanation. Every ugly thought he’d ever had planted on his head popping its ugly head. Every insecurity and bereavement for his past mistakes making him that it had been something solely his fault. Suddenly, the few inches of distance between them is too much. Steve lunges himself at Tony and crushes him to his chest. “I was an idiot, sweetheart. I was an idiot, and I broke us. I broke our family,” it’s the first time Steve has allowed himself to say it. It tears his heart clear in two, and he sobs. Sobs like the child who’d never met his father. Like the little boy who was never quite normal. Like the young man who’d lost his momma. He sobs into Tony’s shoulder and holds him tighter as if that could mend the rift he’s made. “It was me, baby, it was _me_. You trusted me, and I hurt you. Oh God, I swore I’d never hurt you and I did. And I _hate_ ,” Tony flinches in his grasp, but Steve grabs hold of the back of his head. “I _hate myself for it_ , Tony. More than I ever had for anything. I hate what I did to you. I hate what I did to _us_. I just… Please, _please_ , tell me how I can fix this. Please, I know… I _know_ I don’t deserve it, I know, baby, but _please_ … I don’t… I can’t…. I—I—“it’s indecipherable babble after that. Steve himself doesn’t know what he’s saying, but knows he has to keep going. Knows he has to keep begging and maybe, if there is a God somewhere, he might get a chance.

“ _Steve_ ,” Tony says desperately into his ear. The soldier can feel his arms grab hold of the back of his shirt, and he buries his head into Tony’s shoulder. “Steve, please.”

Steve doesn’t know what he’s asking for, but he knows he can’t let go. He can’t let go because if he does then everything breaks. This moment, this tiny moment they’ve created, he can’t shatter it. He can’t break it like he’s broken everything else. In this tiny moment, Tony is his again. In this tiny moment they’re both desperate for things they can’t articulate. In this tiny moment, their past mistakes don’t stain everything.

In this tiny moment, there’s Steve. And there is Tony. And there is a sort of all-consuming love between them that crackles and snaps between them. There’s a desperation to breach a void that is no longer physical. A bridge that can’t be mended with a bone-crushing hug or desperately seeking fingers.

In this tiny moment, there’s just the two of them and a couple of hearts beginning to mend.


End file.
